Monday Night Raw Review - April 29, 2024

By Graham "GSM" Matthews

Nia Jax Confronted Women's World Champion Becky Lynch and Liv Morgan

As I mentioned in my analysis of Night 1 of the 2024 WWE Draft, Morgan pretty much had to remain on Raw to resume her chase for the Women's World Championship. I'm adamant that she should beat Lynch for the title at some point and turn heel in the process. Jax showing up was slightly random because you'd think she was done with the two of them now that she's on SmackDown, but I guess they wanted to do Jax vs. Morgan one more time before they're separates.

Gunther def. Xavier Woods

I know The New Day beat Ludwig Kaiser and Giovanni Vinci last week, but this was an unnecessary match with Gunther already having beaten Woods almost exactly a year ago on SmackDown to retain the Intercontinental Championship. It was a quality contest between the current King of the Ring and hopefully the next King of the Ring, so I can't complain too much, not to mention that the finish was well done with Kofi Kingston nearly throwing in the towel for Woods before Woods tapped out.

Braun Strowman Saved Jey Uso from United States Champion Logan Paul and The Judgment Day

This whole segment felt like an excuse to get NFL star Patrick Mahomes more television time (Strowman briefly faced off with him at ringside). Uso vs. Paul and Strowman vs. Paul are intriguing matchups, but we're not going to see either of them anytime soon because Paul staying on SmackDown for now as United States Champion and the others were drafted to Raw. Uso had some interaction with Judgment Day ahead of the main event, but this didn't do much for me, personally.

Intercontinental Champion Sami Zayn def. Bronson Reed by Disqualification

I was surprised to see this given away without it being announced in advance (unless I missed something), but it became clear  by the end when we got the non-finish. It was an enjoyable outing prior to that point. Chad Gable interfering means a Triple Threat is on the horizon. Maybe we get that at King and Queen of the Ring in Saudi Arabia and that's where Gable steals the title.

Candice LeRae def. Maxxine Dupri

As soon as this started, I knew it was meant to be the payoff to their program from the last two months because they'd end up on separate shows post-Draft. Sure enough, LeRae and Indi Hartwell were drafted to SmackDown a little later on in the night. All of their matches throughout their feud have been roughly two minutes or less and this was no exception. LeRae won, that's the important thing.

CM Punk Addressed Drew McIntyre

I love that we've gotten Punk in small doses on WWE TV since he got injured in January. It reminds viewers of his rivalry with McIntyre and only adds to the excitement for his eventual return. He cut a fired-up promo on McIntyre here and I liked how McIntyre had to watch from the luxury box because Punk tricked him into going there. Punk sporting his classic 2011 tee was a nice touch.

Liv Morgan def. Nia Jax

I liked that we got this one last match between them so Jax could put over Morgan before leaving for SmackDown. Unfortunately, it wasn't very good. It was largely okay, but the last two moves Morgan hit on Jax looked terrible. This was hurt by the crowd being quiet and I can't blame because Morgan is on the verge of turning heel and Jax is already a heel. If nothing else, this gets Morgan one step closer to challenging Lynch for the Women's World Championship.

World Tag Team Champions Awesome Truth def. Alpha Academy (Akira Tozawa and Otis)

Gable was shown talking to R-Truth backstage earlier in the episode, so he must have worked out a deal to get Tozawa and Otis a title shot despite them doing nothing to earn it. These are two comedy teams and there was no reason to think Alpha Academy was winning, so this was a throwaway match. Both teams are remaining on Raw, so why not save it for another time when it could possibly mean a little more? The best thing I can say about it is that they kept it on the shorter side.

Jey Uso, Andrade and Ricochet def. The Judgment Day (Finn Balor, JD McDonagh and World Heavyweight Champion Damian Priest)

Andrade has been drafted to SmackDown, so this was the last we'll see of him with Judgment Day. It was a perfectly solid main event and I understand it was designed to hype the World Heavyweight Championship clash for Backlash, but there was nothing out of the ordinary about it whatsoever. Uso's crew winning was logical with him getting the title opportunity against Priest, but I still don't see him as a legitimate threat.

Overall Show

Putting the draft picks themselves aside (and I'll have my complete analysis of each pick up in a separate post sometime this week as I did for Night 1), this was a fairly flat episode and easily one of Raw's weakest in a while. I actually thought it was weaker than Night 1, probably because the current format of the WWE Draft isn't overly exciting and stretching it out over three hours makes for a mundane show. It certainly didn't feel like a strong go-home show for Backlash, but that's likely because Raw doesn't have much of a presence on that card.

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